Productions
Although the play had previous small runs in provincial theatres in 1898, its metropolitan première took place on 7 November 1899 at the Moscow Art Theatre. Konstantin Stanislavski played the role of Astrov while Chekhov's future wife Olga Knipper played Elena. The initial reviews were favourable yet pointed to defects in both the play and the acting. As the staging and the acting improved over successive performances, however, and as "the public understood better its inner meaning and nuances of feeling," the reviews improved. Uncle Vanya became a permanent fixture in the Moscow Art Theatre.
Other actors who have appeared in notable stage productions of Uncle Vanya include Franchot Tone, Cate Blanchett, Jacki Weaver, Anthony Sher, Ian McKellen, William Hurt, George C. Scott, Derek Jacobi and Trevor Eve. The cast of the celebrated 1963 Laurence Olivier production is discussed below under Film and opera adaptations. The play was also adapted as the new stage-play Dear Uncle by the British playwright Alan Ayckbourn, who reset it in the 1930s Lake District - this adaptation premiered from July to September 2011 at the Stephen Joseph Theatre.
The Reduced Shakespeare Company performed a shortened version of the play on their BBC radio show, which contained only three lines:
Are you Uncle Vanya?
I am.
Ouch!
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Famous quotes containing the word productions:
“If you think it will only add one sprig to the wreath the country twines to bind the brows of my hero, I will run the risk of being sneered at by those who criticize female productions of all kinds. ...Though a female, I was born a patriot.”
—Annie Boudinot Stockton (1736–1801)
“It is well known, that the best productions of the best human intellects, are generally regarded by those intellects as mere immature freshman exercises, wholly worthless in themselves, except as initiatives for entering the great University of God after death.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Most new things are not good, and die an early death; but those which push themselves forward and by slow degrees force themselves on the attention of mankind are the unconscious productions of human wisdom, and must have honest consideration, and must not be made the subject of unreasoning prejudice.”
—Thomas Brackett Reed (1839–1902)